Five Graves To Cairo (1943)

Set in Egypt, an English soldier (Franchot Tone) is the sole survivor of a battle between British soldiers and Rommel's Afrika Corps. He stumbles upon a small hotel where the Germans are setting up temporary quarters. With the help of the hotel owner (Akim Tamiroff) and the maid (Anne Baxter), he usurps the identity of the hotel's recently deceased waiter. When the Germans arrive, he discovers he's adopted the identity of a German spy! Loosely based on the play HOTEL IMPERIAL by Lajos Biro and directed by Billy Wilder (SOME LIKE IT HOT). The majority of WWII propaganda films don't hold up well, this vehicle is an exception. Not surprisingly, rather than a heavy handed propaganda piece, Wilder and co-writer Charles Brackett's screenplay turns out to be devilishly clever and generously laced with humor while still taking its subject dead serious. The film is stolen by Erich von Stroheim who gives a sly performance as an eccentric , over confident Field Marshal Rommel but Baxter is also very good too as a bitter French maid while Tamiroff's dizzy innkeeper provides the majority of the laughs. It's not till the very end that Wilder saves the proselytizing propaganda but it's very brief and softened by the poignancy of the scene. With Peter Van Eyck and Fortunio Bonanova as an opera singing Italian general.